Biden plays waiting game on budget

President Barack Obama said in early March that Vice President Joe Biden would help seal an overdue budget deal with Republicans. Instead of playing a major role, however, Biden so far has been monitoring the debate from afar — and waiting for the call to send him in as the closer.

Republicans say Biden has been virtually invisible since an initial March 4 meeting to start negotiations on reaching a budget deal, and several GOP offices confirmed to POLITICO that Biden hasn’t met with them in person since then. Some of them say that Biden's absence confirms their suspicions that the White House isn't serious about negotiating over the budget, even though a government shutdown on April 8 is at stake.

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Republicans have mocked Biden for leaving for Russia, Finland and Moldova just after joining the budget talks in early March. And last week, Biden showed up at the New York Yankees' spring training camp while stumping for Sen. Bill Nelson's reelection in Florida.

Instead of working on the budget, “he’s playing baseball," chided Brendan Buck, a spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner. Buck later said Boehner’s office isn’t making any “official complaints” about Biden’s role, and that the talks can move forward without him – as long as the vice president and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid are “of the same mind.”

But in the last few days, Biden seems to have been moving at a quicker pace.

The White House responded to the narrative of Biden being detached by quickly announcing that he had called Boehner and Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell from Moscow. And the White House told POLITICO that Biden called Boehner and Reid last Thursday.

“The White House has been in daily communication with budget negotiators – and discussions have been ongoing at many levels,” Elizabeth Alexander, a Biden spokeswoman, said in the statement. Alexander wouldn’t describe those “discussions,” but she later added that Biden talked about the budget with Republicans during a St. Patrick’s Day lunch on Capitol Hill and afterward.